There are other ways to promote the premature deaths of old, ill and disabled people other than assisted suicide, euthanasia, and “futility” policies. One way is to chop away at their health care.
From the Wall Street Journal:
John McCain would pay for his health plan with major reductions to Medicare and Medicaid, a top aide said, in a move that independent analysts estimate could result in cuts of $1.3 trillion over 10 years to the government programs.
The Republican presidential nominee has said little about the proposed cuts, but they are needed to keep his health-care plan “budget neutral,” as he has promised. The McCain campaign hasn’t given a specific figure for the cuts, but didn’t dispute the analysts’ estimate.
John McCain arrives at a town-hall meeting Friday at Colorado State University. In the months since Sen. McCain introduced his health plan, statements made by his campaign have implied that the new tax credits he is proposing to help Americans buy health insurance would be paid for with other tax increases.
But Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Sen. McCain’s senior policy adviser, said Sunday that the campaign has always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid. Those government health-care programs serve seniors, poor families and the disabled. Medicare spending for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 is estimated at $457.5 billion.
To be fair, the McCain camp claims this will be done through getting rid of fraud and waste and improving services to those who depend on Medicare and Medicaid:
Mr. Holtz-Eakin said the Medicare and Medicaid changes would improve the programs and eliminate fraud, but he didn’t detail where the cuts would come from. “It’s about giving them the benefit package that has been promised to them by law at lower cost,” he said.
I think most people would find it pretty doubtful that you can cut 1.3 trillion dollars from Medicaid and Medicare even if you eliminated all fraud and waste. Unless, of course, you start redefining “waste.”
However this election turns out, disability advocates and activists will have our hands full. We’re in the midst a financial meltdown, record deficits, declines in tax revenue, etc. We should all be justifiably concerned about the very real danger that government and society will find new justifications to save money by cutting resources to segments of the population perceived as “nonproductive.”
At the very least, this economy will provide plenty of encouragement for increased promotion and implementation of “futile care” policies. I’m curious to see if the economic drivers behind these policies become more openly discussed in the new reality. –Stephen Drake
The ideology of “cutting government waste” all too often slides over into “disposing of human beings whom we regard as waste.”
So much for a Culture of Life….
Hopefully with the polls the way they are we won’t have to worry about McCain and his dimwit of a running mate. He also says he is going to give everyone a $5000.00 tax credit to go out and buy their own insurance. He has no clue what insurance costs are. I have a private plan that costs me $650.00 per month, if you add that up McCain’s tax credit would only cover about half the year. Is he planing on signing a bailout plan for main street? That would be a no. He has health care payed by guess who? The American tax payer and he will get it for life.
Robert
Michigan
I’ve been really following the U.S. campaign since Sarah Palin got nominated as McCain’s VP candidate.
Concerning the McCain health-care plan, I do think that after the election, whether or not McCain is elected, I think he will connect the dots how everything will balance.
Before the election, I don’t blame him for not getting down to every nickel and dime of the budget. Obama just waffles a couple of days later with a change in what he said earlier.
It’s pretty obvious that Obama has been donated the Presidency. From when the mainstream media drowned everybody with lies, that the people who aren’t voting for Obama are “racists”, it was definitely a code to warn everybody that if you don’t vote for Obama, all your friends and relatives won’t believe you aren’t a racist.
What I forsee from an Obama Presidency is Oregon’s state coverage will be the solution for all 50 states. Anybody with cancer, who can’t prove that they will survive 5 years, will be refused cancer treatments.
With Sarah Palin’s speeches on special needs spending, and to enforce Federal funding which was drafted over thirty years ago, McCain’s government will deal with all those aspects of the health-care plan.
This year’s campaign has been nothing short of a witch hunt against McCain-Palin, if there ever was one.
In 1991 I remember Pat Buchanan on CNN’s Cross-fire. One night he said, “the Democratic Party is the Communist Regime of the Rich”!
What do you want to bet, that all those Wall Street heads who are assigned to fix the problem they created, will be Obama’s increased size of government.
I think Americans can kiss good-bye using that $750 billion rescue package, to do what it was intended to do, to buy up all the bad mortgages and reset the prices affordable, so the people can keep their homes.
That is all a necessary part of the plan under McCain’s government, and to get the economy going again. People can recover their losses, and the government will be able to use that bail-out money to include changes made with health-care insurance plans.